


Ill-Fitting Black Suits

by cnomad



Category: Suits (TV)
Genre: Episode: s02e01 She Knows, Gen, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-16
Updated: 2012-06-16
Packaged: 2017-11-07 20:56:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/435361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cnomad/pseuds/cnomad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And suddenly all Harvey can think of is Mike -- ten-years-old, standing in his first ill-fitting suit, and burying his parents.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ill-Fitting Black Suits

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this prompt](http://suits-meme.livejournal.com/10789.html?thread=3139109#t3139109) on the suits-meme.
> 
> To clarify: I know that Mike's parents died when he was eleven, not ten. But this story is written from Harvey's POV and he wasn't present for the dinner with Jessica. His knowledge of that information is limited, and he is unreliable when it comes to the details of Mike's childhood.

It’s dark now, and Harvey is home alone spread out across his couch staring out at the Manhattan skyline. His favorite Tom Ford suit jacket is carelessly lying on the floor, and he’s still wearing his shoes despite propping them up on his glass coffee table. The tie around his neck is undone and he’s pushed his sleeves up to his elbows, not bothering to care about the wrinkles he’s made in the fabric. In his hand he cradles a half empty class of his most expensive scotch. He knows that across the city, Mike is stumbling into his office only to find Jessica standing in place of where Mike expects Harvey to be. If she hadn’t been standing right next to him as he’d made the call, Harvey knows he would have warned his associate of what to expect. Instead the kid is going to have to handle the situation and keep his surprise close to his chest – just like Harvey has taught him to.

He could have stayed for Mike. He could have stood beside him and protected him from Jessica’s harsh words. She wouldn’t have liked it – probably would have fought him tooth and nail about it – but it was already clear that she couldn’t fire either of them without opening herself up to all sorts of trouble. He could have stayed. He could have helped Mike. It’s what he’d been planning to do – but then Jessica had dropped that bomb of information in his lap and expected him to already know and Harvey just— couldn’t. He had to leave.

So here he is now. Drinking the scotch he’d promised the wealthy client who’d given it to him that he would wait for the right moment to open the bottle. Harvey’s sure the man had meant a more celebratory occasion than protecting some associate’s job and then finding out the kid held even more secrets than Harvey could have guessed.

The thing is – Harvey should have known. He should have figured it out. What other twenty-some year old kids are struggling to pay for their grandmother’s medical bills? That’s not supposed to be the grandkid’s job, and even Harvey – whose own family life is entirely too fucked up – knows that much. Yet perhaps it is _because_ of how messed up his own family is that Harvey has avoided asking some of the most basic questions about Mike’s.

He takes another sip of his drink as he thinks of Mike – ten years old with wide, too blue eyes and ruffled blonde hair probably curling around his ears. Wearing his first suit: an ill-fitting black outfit picked out by grieving hands for a boy too young to understand the tradition or the symbolism of the color. All for the funeral of his two dead parents, hit by a drunk driver on their way home to tuck their baby boy into bed.

Harvey’s chest feels tight, and he coughs while swallowing a large mouthful of his scotch, the alcohol burning as it makes its way down his throat. His apartment is too quiet other than for the sound of his own breathing, and he wishes he had thought to put on a record when he’d first come in – but now his body feels sluggish and over exhausted and there’s nothing that could make him get up again.

Instead he leans his head back, closing his eyes and focusing on the rise and fall of his own chest. But that only reminds him of Mike’s parents and how they took their last breath without even knowing it, and suddenly all Harvey can think of is Mike – Mike who must have felt so lost at such a young age. Who allowed himself to let the words, “he’s my oldest friend” mean more than they should have. Who could still smile so brilliantly when Harvey was looking his way. Who couldn’t find it himself to confide in Harvey about the two people he’d loved and lost – but had told Jessica instead, as she calculated his every word and prepared to squash him beneath her six-inch heels.

And maybe that’s what hurt the most. Not that Mike had never told him – because to be completely fair, Harvey has shared so very little with Mike about his own family – but that when the kid was finally willing to share his story, he gave it freely to someone vying only to hurt him. Who was plotting to expose him and fire him and prove he wasn’t _Pearson Hardman_ worthy. Who couldn’t see his worth and potential and inherent _decency_ as a human being – something that Pearson Hardman has been sorely lacking.

Harvey opens his eyes and looks back at the Manhattan skyline – all the lights shining fiercely in the dark – and all he can think is that Mike deserves better. A better life. A better best friend. A better mentor.

A better _Harvey_.

And he cringes, shame radiating through him, as he thinks of all the times he told Mike he didn’t care or didn’t want to hear about his problems. Because hearing them from Jessica was ten times worse than anything he could have imagined.

Swallowing the last of his drink, he knows he won’t ever let that happen again. 

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to follow me at [my tumblr](http://cinematicnomad.tumblr.com/) where I often post drabbles and other fangirlish things.


End file.
